Forth Sunday of Lent - Cycle B

 Forth Sunday of Lent -  Cycle B
Readings: 2 Chronicles 36:14-16, 19-23, Ps 137 “Let my tongue be silenced, if I ever forget you! ”, Ephesians2:4-10, John 3:14-21
 
My dear brothers and sisters in Christ, this Sunday we celebrate the fourth Sunday of Lent, which is traditionally called Laetare Sunday from the opening words of the Entrance Antiphon. “Rejoice with Jerusalem and beglad for her, all you who love her”. This Sunday speaks to us of joy, because as we journey to the Calvary
with Jesus this Lent, we are reminded that the moment of our redemption is coming closer. Joy has a spiritual origin, arising from a heart that loves and feels itself loved by God.  Today, rose-colored vestments are permitted in place of purple. In this way the church reminds us that joy is perfectly compatible with mortification and pain. It is sinlessness and not penance which is opposed to happiness.

In today’s Gospel, a Pharisee talks to Jesus about God. Nicodemus went to Jesus under the cover of darkness. Through their encounter Jesus tells him and us that “God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son”. God’ supreme gift was given out of love, not out of desire to humiliate or condemn the world. The Gospel expresses the hope that if we really believe God loved us we would surely emerge from our darkness. It the dark and it is difficult to see God; it is difficult to think about him. Perhaps we would come into the light more readilyif we believe that the light we are entering is not the light of condemnation. As we celebrate the love of God in the sacred liturgy let our hearts be filled with joy. The joy that no one or nothing can take from us.
Amen.
 
Fr. Paschal Chester, svd